Wednesday, June 22, 2011

At first glance, it is hard to spot this discreet little place. The confusing layers of unlabelled floors in the midst of construction seem to camouflage it so well.

Nevertheless, those familiar with this maze seem to have sniffed the place out as it was packed for lunch.

We turned up for dinnertime and was surprised to see patrons there even though it was only a few tables. Pretty good considering they are so well hidden from the naked eye.

Feeling a little lost around the menu, we felt a way through the menu.

First, it was the toufu avocado salad (RM19) - a refreshing mix of salad leaves, crunchy seaweed, smooth wakame sheets, avocado slices, tofu cubes - all tossed in a wasabi soy sauce dressing. The balance of the wasabi was just right to kick up our appetites.

Next, it was one of the picks from the hand written daily specials. We were leaning towards the alluring sound of their homemade deep fried beef mince patty. It must have been good stuff as they had sold it out. Drats! Looks like we need to return to try it.

Instead we were steered towards the gyu miso yaki (RM22) - steak marinated in a sweet tasting sauce with a melt-in-the-mouth texture and a nice grilled crispy edges. On the side was a dollop of mild tasting yellow miso to add as a dip. Reminds me a little of my French lamb rack from Cilantro that came with a hatcho (deep red) miso for flavour.

I was gunning for the prawns with lotus root but the waiter suggested the hotate iso yaki (RM12) - grilled scallop with two types of mushrooms: enoki and hon shimeji. The broth is sweet but I did feel the scallop was a wee overcooked being a little less succulent.

The big misdemeanor was our simple salmon maki (RM15). The seaweed roll with julienne cucumbers and salmon sashimi was laden with wasabi that had both of us blowing our heads apart. Completely mind blowing stuff that would wake up any stuffed nose. Believe me, we won't be ordering this again.

They're a little uninventive with makis as the other variety available is filled with minced tuna or negitoro. What we did spy were their specialty of nabe aka the Japanese version of steamboat that they had specially inbuild induction hobs at each table. They also serve claypot rice.

We reckon we'll return again as the food is simple fare that we like but we'll definitely be avoiding their makis for the time being. Incidentally, they are also having a special promotion for June, complimentary ice cream (vanilla, goma or matcha) for dessert. We sampled the goma and matcha, which were pretty good stand-bys to beat the heat. Incidentally, it's name has some reference to trees or wood as it's motif is a large shady tree.

(Pork Free. Open from Monday to Saturday for lunch and dinner. Closed on Sundays. Located further up Old Town White Coffee and below Nathalie's Gourmet Studio. More pictures in the Flickr set.)

*Disclaimer: The opinions expressed here is entirely based on my personal tastebuds and may vary for others. This review is time sensitive; changes may occur to the place later on that can affect this opinion. The reviewer also declares that she has not received any monetary or non-monetary compensation from this place for writing the review.